Dvd/cd rw

The DVD/CD player in my Dell laptop won't read a DVD. It will read a CD with no problem. When i put a DVD in I can hear it trying but it don't read it. Tells me to put a disk in. Is there some setting somewhere to tell it to read DVD's?
I tried with three different DVD's but no go. I want to try out the program DVD To Go.

You may need to reinstall the proper driver for the device. If your operating system doesn't recognize the device, it will assign a generic driver or put it on the "unknown device" list. If it is on the unknown device list, you'll have to go to the device manager and uninstall it before you can reinstall it properly. otherwise, you'll end up with two instances of the same device in the device manager and neither will work properly.
Good luck! hope you figure it out soon, I know how frustrating that can be.

Have you ever wondered why things intended to make our lives simpler keep getting more complicated to use?

No, it has the right device in the Device Manager. I think it may have gone bad. Thanks for your input, though.

The device may be right but if you reformatted you probably didnt get the proper drivers installed. I know if you go to the web site of your laptop(dell.com or whatever it is) you can find your model numbers and download the drivers for your pc. I would try that